The Italy and the Unified Patent Court (UPC) have signed a headquarters agreement, see press release of the Italian government.

The Headquarters Agreement comes after the Administrative Committee of the Unified Patent Court unanimously decided last June to set up a section of the central division of the UPC in Milan. The section of the central division in Milan should open its doors mid of this year, but an official communication has not yet been released.

The central division of the Court of First Instance of the UPC is in particular responsible for isolated revocations actions and declaration of non-infringement. Infringement actions are usually filed before the local divisions of the Court of First Instance.

The Milan section of the central division will be responsible for patents in IPC section A (Human necessities) without supplementary protection certificates (SPCs). The Munich section of the central division will remain responsible for the IPC section C (Chemistry, metallurgy) without SPCs. The supplementary protection certificates of IPC sections A and C are then assigned to the Paris Seat.

Currently the actions pending before the central division related to patents in IPC section (A) are assigned to Paris and in IPC section (C) are assigned to the section of the central division in Munich.